Accomplices

Accomplices, formerly known as the Informal Meeting, brings together artists, writers, and curators from the Arab world to discuss questions and concerns about the present and future of their field and practices. Held annually in a remote location, it aims at being an intimate situation that provokes common language, sparks possibilities for invention, or simply a necessary assurance that distinct conversations pour into and feed a common pool of ideas and aspirations. The guest list of twenty or so participants centers on artists, writers, and curators who are active in art projects distinct from their individual practices, and are part of the Arab world’s emerging generation of art practitioners. Accomplices is an opportunity for conversation rather than presentation, and attendance is therefore limited to each event’s invited guest list.

2018

In 2018 Accomplices was held in San Sebastian/Donostia, Spain, in collaboration with Tabakalera, from January 26 to 27. Loosely themed around the question of “Where is the audience?”, the meeting asked participants to grapple with questions about their ideal audience, about how their practice might change were the internet to disappear, about encounters with physical objects, and about sharing their work with family and childhood friends.

Participants:

Dareen Abbas

Dara Abdallah

Noor Abed

Aseel AlYaqoub

George Awde

Alia Ayman

Nouha Ben Yebdri

Hicham Bouzid

Abla elBahrawy

Mostafa Heddaya

Suna Kafadar

Amal Khalaf

Mark Lotfy

Magda Magdy

Kamila Metwaly

Radouan Mriziga

Mary Jirmanus Saba

Marnie Slater

Ma’n Abu Taleb

2016

This sixth edition of our Informal Meeting program was held on Buyukuda Island, 90 minutes by ferry from Istanbul, from January 29 till February 1, 2016. Under the theme of “affinities”, it asked the participants to reflect on questions regarding the processes and results of collaboration, the role of language in practice and perception, the status of insider versus outsider, and survival in a possible future without the art world.

Parallel to the meeting, SALT and Mophradat presented two public events at SALT Galata: a performance entitled Stones Gods People (Notes for an Opera) by Joe Namy (January 28, 2016) and an evening of readings by Mirene Arsanios and Malak Helmy (February 2, 2016).

Prior to 2015, the Informal Meeting was conceived as a biennial gathering that brought together independent cultural spaces and programmers in the Arab world with the aim of establishing regional networks. The event acted as a forum for the discussion of practical issues and challenges including space management, organizational structure, audience diversification, funding, communication strategies, and legal frameworks. Informal Meetings took place as follows:

Mophradat’s homepage hosts an editorial project that publishes new and existing texts related to contemporary art practices and the languages used to discuss them. Over the coming months, the art collective Nile Sunset Annex (NSA) has been commissioned to be our editorial voice. NSA selects an art-related word each month that has a twist when translated between Arabic and English, and are finding, creating, or commissioning a text in both languages that relates to the selected word. NSA’s process is intended as self-educational and the glossary, rather than being prescriptive, will question the terms and their uses in both languages. As NSA describes, “the conversations that arise in attempts to find common ground or agree on the significance or etymology of certain words can be a space of potential.” NSA is working on this glossary with translator Ziad Chakaroun.

Nile Sunset Annex (NSA) primarily functions as an art space that puts on monthly exhibitions of artists’ work in a spare room in an apartment in Garden City, Cairo, but it also acts as a publishing house, a contemporary art collection, an archivist, an artist, an author, a bartender, a curator, and an installation team. Founded in January 2013, NSA is still evolving.

Untitled: upturnedhouse was initially shown in New York, where it was installed in a very ad hoc way. This process had to be radically changed when it was agreed that it would be shown in the Carnegie. All its failings exploded into reality. The challenge was to retain its haphazard character, but to construct it as a permanent object. It was as if my love of the conflicting nature of making and un-making were being meticulously scrutinized as a badly told lie — I felt like a criminal whose devious activities were on trial. It was all for good, though; I have been giving my ways of making and un-making a tougher, mental acknowledgement. My works are now being shown more than once — something I do not have much experience with, since in the past my works have been shown and then destroyed, with some materials being salvaged for future use. Making more permanent works has made me more resilient and purposeful about my building and re-building methods. It can be gruelling, and yes, the resulting works are hard won, not necessarily always in a good way. I’m still hanging onto an uneasy relationship with whether the works are ever finished or not, because it generates excitement and uncertainty. I never know if more should be added or removed. I don’t doubt what I am doing, but I want the freedom to change my mind and to be able to undo today’s job tomorrow, regardless of whether it turns out well or badly. I want a fluid thinking process to be realized in the material reality of the work itself, to try and narrow the gap between thought and action.

Phyllida Barlow, in conversation with Vincent Fecteau in Bomb Magazine.